Lewrie finished his cold coffee, set the mug down on the deck, and strolled to the break of the quarterdeck to peer over the hammock stanchions, now full of tightly rolled bedding, down into the waist.
Admiral Lord Keith had not yet ordered the squadron to Quarters, and Lewrie felt it odd to be sailing into action with his crew acting as if it was just another day far out at sea, with their frigate alone and without a threat on the horizons. The ports were still shut, and the great-guns were still snugly bowsed to the gun-port sills, each of them still plugged with red-painted wood tompions in their muzzles. A few men idled round the companionways, but only half the crew, of the starboard watch, stood the watch. Well, there were the Marines… if action was expected in an hour or so, Lt. Simcock was going to be ready for it, and properly dressed, too; his men had doffed their everyday slops and had changed into cockaded hats, red coats, white waist-coats and trousers, and black canvas “half-spatterdash” leggings, with all of their martial accoutrements hung about them.
“France… dammit,” Lewrie muttered, as the squadron closed to within six or seven miles of the shore. “Bloody, bloody, France!”
“Well, some of their young ladies are fetching, sir,” Lieutenant Westcott breezily commented near Lewrie’s side. “Recall the fair Madamoiselle Sylvie at Kingston?”
“Oh, is that why you insisted you lead the boats?” Lewrie said with a laugh. “You’ve a taste for French mutton, have you?”
“I rather doubt there’d be any aboard the invasion boats, sir,” Westcott replied, all whimsy. “Though one might hope?”
Lewrie wished to keep Lt. Westcott aboard Reliant should they run into opposition from French gunboats, but Westcott had asked for a private word and had claimed the honour of leading the boats that would tow the torpedoes in; it was the senior lieutenant’s role by right and tradition, and, “How else may I make a name for myself and gain notice for advancement, sir, if I’m held back?” he’d posed with a wry laugh, and Lewrie had acceded to his desire, charging him to look after his Cox’n, Liam Desmond, and Desmond’s long-time mate, Patrick Furfy.
He would send his oldest Midshipmen; he could spare them, and were men to be lost, it was better to lose Mids than officers. That was traditional, too, and after all, Houghton, Entwhistle, and Mister Warburton had as much need of a bit of fame and notice at Admiralty, and in the papers, as any other man; how else might they advance? And, Lewrie grimly considered, even the most seasoned Midshipmen were as hungry for honour and glory as lion cubs!
“It’s taking long enough,” Captain Speaks impatiently snapped as he strolled up to join them.
Such a pretty day, ’til he ruined it! Lewrie thought, stifling a groan, keeping his gaze fixed on the bow-sprit, and pretending that he had not heard the man.
Just before they had sailed from Portsmouth to join Lord Keith off The Downs, Speaks had come aboard Reliant, without specific orders-and thankfully without his damned parrot!-claiming that making passage in Penarth would interfere too much with Lt. Clough and his preparations, though he also alluded to un-seen orders to see the job right through to the finish, and a “duty” to see “his torpedoes” successful. Lewrie’s orders were to accompany Penarth and use his men and boats to launch the devices, and they made no mention of Speaks, but… Speaks was senior to him, and Lewrie couldn’t drive Speaks back into his hired boat at sword-point, or even demand to see those hinted-at orders, so… he was stuck with the pest! And a garrulous, peevish, and annoying pest he’d turned out to be, practically presiding and ruling meals with Lewrie and his officers, and constantly on the quarterdeck when Lewrie was, never interfering, exactly, with Reliant’s captain and officers of the watch, but hovering, with many a dis-approving scowl, sniff, grunt, questioning cocked brow, or muttered comment!
“They’re my torpedoes, Lewrie, my collier from which you’ll fetch them,” Speaks had briskly rattled off, a calculating little smile upon his face, “and I’m damned well going to see them handled properly.”
A kindly and charitable man might have deemed Captain Speaks’s zeal admirable… the sort of fellow Captain Alan Lewrie definitely was not, even before the bastard had come aboard. No, what the fellow wanted the most, Lewrie suspected, was a chance to be at sea aboard a proper frigate, not a hired-in collier that mounted only pop-guns, and damned few of those. Reliant was a warship very much like Speaks’s last command of 1801, which, had he not come down with pneumonia and had had to be replaced, he might have sailed into the Baltic as a lone ship to scout the Danish, Swedish, and Russian fleets, then returned in time to take part in the glorious battle with Nelson at Copenhagen, and felt robbed of the opportunity.
Lewrie was dead-certain that Speaks had no orders; his brief had been to test the catamaran torpedoes, then turn them over to some other officer to be employed. He might have felt a trifle sorry for the old fellow-had he not been as bristly as a currying brush, nowhere near the “firm but fair” and well-liked officer of old! And if he wished to be close to his charges, and take part in a battle, at long last, more power to him, Lewrie thought-so long as he did so anywhere else but aboard his ship!
“Signal, sir!” Midshipman Munsell, high aloft, called down in a thin and shrill voice, reading off a string of number flags. “General to all ships, with two guns!”
“It is… ‘Come to Anchor,’ sir,” Midshipman Rossyngton said, after a quick scan through his code book.
“Anchor?” Captain Speaks barked. “We’re still five miles off!”
“Have the signal repeated, Mister Rossyngton,” Lewrie told his Mid, “but I’d admire did we fetch-to, Mister Westcott, not anchor, as ordered. Do the French come out, we’d be immobile too long for my liking… and caught tryin’ t’go to Quarters and heave up the best bower and the entire length of a cable at the same time.”
HMS Reliant was put up into wind, fore-and-aft sails still drawing to drive her forward, but with tops’ls aback to act as brakes, and let her make just a bit of stern and lee-way, practically immobilised, but still able to pay off and get back to speed in a mere minute, avoiding getting caught by a French sortie “with her pants down.”
“It was an order,” Captain Speaks muttered half to himself, just loud enough to irk. “Ahem,” he covered, loudly clearing his throat.
“Interpreted by all but the two-deckers and the flagship according to captains’ best judgement, sir,” Lewrie pointed out through gritted teeth, in a rictus of an outwardly pleasant smile. “The rest have fetched-to, the other frigates and such. As you can see,” he added as he swept an arm towards the lighter ships, which stood a little closer to the coast. “I doubt the cutters have anchor cables long enough.”
“Now what, sir?” Lt. Westcott said, after coughing into a fist to change the subject.
“We sit here long enough, Mister Westcott, we might heave up the rum keg, then serve the mid-day meal,” Lewrie cynically replied with a grimace. “I thought we’d just barge up to gun range and blaze away at once. But, that’s up to Admiral Lord Keith. Mister Rossyngton? Pass word for my steward, and he’s t’bring my collapsible chair up.”
Captain Speaks, no fan of Lewrie already, goggled at the order, utterly convinced that Lewrie was the idlest lubber he’d ever met.
“And my penny-whistle, too, Mister Rossyngton,” Lewrie added, sure that that would dismay the fellow even further; far enough, perhaps, to leave the quarterdeck and leave them all in peace? “What’d ye like t’hear, Mister Westcott? ‘Spanish Ladies’?”